Generation of Electron Bessel Beams with Nondiffractive Spreading by a Nanofabricated Annular Slit

The shaping of a wavefront of free electrons has been experimentally realized very recently. We report the generation of an electron Bessel beam using a nanofabricated annular slit. We directly observe that electron Bessel beams propagate while maintaining a narrow beam width over a long propagation distance. In addition, we experimentally verify the self-healing property of these electron beams, which can reconstruct their shape after passing an obstacle. The experimental results are compared with simulation results of the propagation including a hexagonal slit. The present technique of electron Bessel beam generation can be used to develop a novel electron-beam-shaping, an atomic manipulation technique, and a new electron microscopy.